Basketball Recap: Normal West Falls Despite Big Games from Michael Zaleski and Maliq Givens-Smith

It's hard to turn regular season success into postseason wins, a fact Normal West can now relate to. They fell 62-49 to the Normal Community Ironmen on Wednesday. The Wildcats have struggled against the Ironmen recently, as the game was their sixth consecutive lost meetings.

Maliq Givens-Smith

Points

01/10/25 vs Centennial	23
02/26/25 vs Normal Community	21
12/02/24 vs Bloomington Central Catholic	20
02/01/25 vs El Paso-Gridley	18
12/28/24 vs Prosser	18
+ 21 more games

Normal West's defeat shouldn't obscure the performances of Maliq Givens-Smith, who went 7-for-17 en route to 21 points and six assists, and Michael Zaleski, who posted 15 points and three steals. Normal West is 4-2 when Givens-Smith posts 15 or more points, but 3-19 otherwise. Another player making a difference was Oliver Brookins, who scored eight points.

Normal West's loss dropped their record down to 7-21. As for Normal Community, they are on a roll lately: they've won 13 of their last 15 matches. That's provided a nice bump to their 26-6 record this season.

Normal West does not have any more games scheduled as of now. As for Normal Community, they have already played their next contest, a 51-38 victory against Minooka on the 28th.